Staying CHUCKSTRONG

During the tidal wave of scandalous stories in 2012 shipwrecked fans were able to follow the beacon of light that Chuck Pagano provided for those in search of a positive sports story.

As October began so did Pagano’s battle for his life. The 52 year old coach was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia. His bone marrow was producing abnormal white blood cells to interfere with the everyday functions of the normal blood cells. And coaching football seemed to be an afterthought.

But the fate of their coach was on the minds of every Colts player when they squared off against the Green Bay Packers on October 7th.

Indy was down 21-3 at halftime to one of the most prolific offenses in the National Football League and the game was all over except for the press conferences. The home team was thoroughly outmatched.

Then Andrew Luck threw for two touchdowns. Then he ran for a third. And when Packers kicker Mason Crosby missed a 51 yard field goal at the end of the game, the Colts laid exhausted on the field of battle, victorious.

With that win, the Colts had laid the foundation in which the nation of CHUCKSTRONG would be built upon.

2012 would be remembered as the year in which the Indianapolis Colts became America’s team. 32 Colts shaved their heads in solidarity for their ailing coach. Two cheerleaders followed suit by raising 22,000 dollars for CHUCKSTRONG after letting the team mascot shave their heads.

The nation of CHUCKSTRONG was a safe haven for fans surrounded by the scandal of sports and the tragedies in the real world. This year featured the unspeakable tragedy of Newtown Connecticut, the hardships of Hurricane Sandy, the alarming increase of athletes committing suicide, and scandals ranging from Penn State to Bounty Gate.

Yet through it all, the Indianapolis Colts borrowed Cinderella’s slipper and served as a beacon of hope for sports fans across the nation. The countless people affected by all types of cancer gained a role model, an icon, and a spokesman in the world of sports.

To date, the improbable run has all but been completed. Indianapolis, a team that went 2-14 a year ago now sits at 10-5. These Colts made the playoffs while ranking 22^nd in the NFL in rushing yards per game and 18^th in points per game. Even as the playoffs loom, only two Colts made the pro bowl.

But the Colts had a cause that fueled them far greater than any paycheck ever could. The players on Indianapolis were all playing to honor a man who wants nothing more than to dance with his two daughters at their weddings. 

The Colts will channel those feeling one more time for their coach in week 17. Pagano will be coming back to coach the Colts in their final home game of the regular season. The stadium will most assuredly be shaking and the Colts will lay their hearts on the turf of Lucas Oil Stadium for the man who has inspired them.

With the leukemia in remission and America’s team in good condition, 2012 will be remembered as the year a man inspired a nation to keep hoping, keep fighting, and stay CHUCKSTRONG.

Viva Viagra?

Sooner rather than later, we could see an NFL player barred from playing the game for having an erection lasting longer than four hours.

Adderall has landed two Seattle Seahawks in hot water, but perhaps the newest drug of choice for NFL athletes, Viagra, could help them play better on the field and between the sheets.

In a sportingnews.com article, Bears wide receiver Brandon Marshall said that he has heard of NFL players taking Viagra to help them get an edge on game day. Granted that Marshall let on this little golden nugget of information because he was asked about Adderall, but now Viagra is in the news again. Now the debate regarding whether or not the little blue pill should be illegal in professional sports is on like Donkey Kong.

Naturally, your curiosity has been piqued. Since the average age of an NFL player is 27, it would be hard pressed to think that these guys are taking Viagra for its scientifically generated purpose: helping old men across America re-awaken their own one eyed wonder weasels for a strained go around while their partner wonders whether or not their bottle rocket will pop off mid-launch.

Now that you have that image burned into your brains, there actually is scientific evidence that suggests that this is completely possible. An article published by magicbluepill.com said that Viagra dilates blood vessels and forcing the body to pump more blood through the lungs and get more oxygen to the muscles.

The New York Daily News also reported that Viagra can counteract the impotence created by testosterone injections and other performance-enhancing drugs.

The burning question is whether or not the NFL has banned or should look into banning Viagra. To date, the World Anti-Doping Agency has not barred the little blue pill from being used because the effects of the drug at sea-level have not yielded the same results as high altitude usage. Although in an interesting plot twist, the WADA has banned ExtenZe because it contains the steroid Dehydropiandrosterone.

This is fantastic marketing for the NFL while the drug is still in play. Slogans like “Viagra: Because anything that lasts longer than four hours is a sporting event,” or “Viagra: The male enhancement drug all our players are using,” or “Need to get up on game day? The NFL does with Viagra,” or “Viagra: Helping NFL players get third and long,” and finally “In a game of inches, Viagra gives you the edge on Sundays.”

The possibilities for these slogans are nearly endless.  

If the NFL actually does go out of its way to ban the old man mast rising drug they will be able to hide behind the notion that Viagra could be used in a PED cocktail and would use it to beat drug testing.

Well that and every player doped up on Viagra would make fumble pile ups incredibly awkward. And it could re-define the “illegal contact” penalty.

But other than those reasons, NFL players will be saying viva Viagra unless it gets banned. Or they suffer from the side effects, whichever comes first. 

Conspiracy in the NHL: Bet(man) on It.

That loud bang that you heard in the basement of that dank room was the sound of the conspiracy theory machine being started up for the first time in a while.

Everyone loves a good conspiracy theory. That is why there are a million different conspiracy theories surrounding the death of President Kennedy; well that and the incredibly sketchy circumstances surrounding his death, but that’s for another day. Conspiracies are the same thing as rumors. Well, conspiracies are like rumors if those rumors were on steroids while drinking red bull and taking a bath in HGH.

Today the conspiracy theory machine is here to tackle the ineptitude behind the NHL lockout. Since Commissioner Gary Bettman and Donald Fehr seem to have their heads so far up their hindquarters that they can’t even talk about ending the lockout, it is impossible to keep the conspiracies away.

Here is the best theory the machine came up with and one that makes the “Killer KGB” theory look stupid: Bettman was planted to run the NHL by NBA commissioner David Stern in order to single handedly ruin the sport.

Now before you try to find where the conspiracy theory machine and go all office space on it, consider the following.

Bettman was first brought into the NBA in 1981 to serve in the league offices as a marketing and legal consultant. The Betts also eventually rose to third in command in the NBA before finally placing himself as the personal assistant and Senior Vice President of Commissioner Stern.

On February 1, 1993, the NHL hired an executive search firm to help find a new commissioner, wait for it, at the exact same time that then president Gil Stein was appointed NHL president. Since Stein did not have the best interests of the owners at heart the NHL, hockey decides to look for a new face to run the league. An article by Joe Lapointe of The New York Times explains that Bettman is brought in order to “modernize the views of the ‘old-guard’ within the ownership ranks”

Bettman was elected to be the league’s first commissioner by the NHL governors at the end of 1992 and Stein bowed out of the race to be the first commissioner in order to avoid a destructive battle with the league. So Bettman now has the power of the NHL president and one year after getting hired by the NHL, the 1994-1995 lockout that lasted 104 days happens.

Meanwhile in the NBA during that time there were a couple of major events in the sport. While the NHL was locked out in 1994-1995, Michael Jordan came out of retirement and began his second assent to greatness, Moses Malone retired, the Celtics played their last season in the Boston Garden, and Hakeem Olajuwon’s Houston Rockets beat Patrick Ewing’s New York Knicks in the NBA Finals.

The Rockets Knicks NBA Finals scored a Nielsen Rating of 12.4 when Bettman locked out the players in 1994-1995. As we all know, Jordan began to run rampant in the NBA shortly after and it saw ratings that touched the moon on the way into space.

Today, Bettman has his league in its third elongated work stoppage during his tenure and the NBA is enjoying the apex of LeBron James’ career.

So Stern screwed over his main competition for weekly ratings by planning a mole (Bettman) in the sport to destroy it from the inside out.

Seems legit.

Tied Up

          

            Well this is awkward.

           

            The San Francisco 49ers and Saint Louis Rams somehow played 75 minutes of football and nobody won. They each made big plays, scored points, and made defensive stops, yet the final score was 24-24. This phenomenon has not happened since 2008 when the Eagles and Bengals were done playing with the score 13-13.

            Ties are more awkward than a guy’s first contraceptive purchase. They are more baffling than trying to explain the birds and the bees to your eleven year old son.

You don’t know how to react to a tie as a fan because you can’t really be mad at the result one way or another. People paid good money to watch a football game that ended without a tangible result. Although in the case of San Francisco, they will probably have more questions than answers about them because they were big time favorites to beat the Rams.

            And the post game press conferences are just open ended venting sessions that don’t make sense.

            Ties are a journalist’s nightmare. When a team wins or loses, writers are dependent on portraying the causes that lead to the results. Causes and effects fuel journalism stories like diesel fuel fuels a Mercedes.

            However, ties are the journalistic equivalent of putting gas in a car and having the car stall out after driving it on the highway for 50 miles. You know that you were either supposed to get to your destination fine, or something would lead to you getting lost. But

stalling out is just awkward because you don’t know what lead to this result; ties work the exact same way.

            Don’t get me wrong, there is still plenty of good stuff that can be taken away from this game. This tie made Alex Smith suddenly a lot more valuable as a quarterback because without him, the 49ers can’t even beat the Rams. The young Rams team played well against presumably one of the best teams in the NFC. And Colin Kapernick is not and will never be an NFL starter because he can’t even beat the Rams.

            Still, looking at all angles a tie in a professional sporting event should not happen nor should it be allowed to happen. Yes there is the overwhelming argument of player safety and if the NFL actually gave a damn about the players it would be a valid argument. But the average NFL player gets paid an average of 1.9 million dollars a year to produce wins not ties. Simply put, the players and coaches are making too much money for a nine billion dollar industry to give out a half baked result like a tie.

            Ties leave both teams with more questions than answers. So it makes sense to ask to ask why the NFL even bothers letting ties exist at all. Well if they want to be awkward let them its’ their loss…err win….no wait tie.

            Yup. It’s still awkward. 

Don't Wait

Patience is by in large a good thing. Patience teaches your young sibling that the line does not move faster by yelling at it. Patience helps you keep a level head when your crush doesn’t text you back in .039486572 seconds.       

Yet in college football today, patience is meaningless. We don’t have to wait two years to get rid of the BCS when we are on the verge of another national champion controversy.

The four team playoff system that will restore the integrity of competition in college football will be implemented in 2014, not 2012. However, with Alabama, Kansas State, Oregon, and Notre Dame all 9-0 college football appears on the verge of another title snubbing season.

Here is a crazy idea that the FBS should consider, install the new format this season. Waiting for two years to install a system tailor made to solve the issue of today simply is stupid.

For the love of whatever deity you may or may not believe in, the new playoff is what the fans want.

College football fans want to see if the Irish can win a title for the first time since the Reagan administration. The fans who love the sport want to see if Optimums Kline (which by the way is one of the five best nicknames in sports today) can run against the vaunted defense of Alabama. And pundits across the sport want to see if anybody can stop Oregon, a team that seems to only recruit guys who can run the 40 yard dash in 4.35 seconds.

Suppose for a second all four teams go undefeated, then the computers will be left to determine who plays for a national championship and who gets hosed. And that is no way to determine who wins any sport.

Now the BCS could get lucky again. They faced a similar issue in 2002 when seven of the top ten teams in college football went undefeated through the first week of Nov. When that first weekend of Nov came around, four of the seven unbeaten teams lost. The controversy was settled when the last extra unbeaten fell and undefeated Miami played undefeated Ohio State in the ‘Willis McGahee-blew-out-his-knee’ national title game.

But we could get a collegiate catastrophe, again. It’s hard to forget when the Tigers of Auburn finished without a loss in 2004, but because of the computers, USC played Oklahoma for the national title. And an undefeated team did not even play for the right to call themselves champions.

The chances of more than two undefeated teams are slim, yet those who run college football should not even consider letting that happen again.

So put the four team playoff format in now, those in college football don’t have to be patient here.

Hard on James

Wait, hold on a second. You mean to tell me that an athlete left a winning team that he was a big part of to go earn about 4 million dollars more for a cellar dweller? I don’t know if you can see it, but I am doing the E-Trade Baby shocked face right about now.

The Oklahoma City Thunder did not want to pay Harden a max deal and they traded him when they learned they could get something of value back. That is the business of sports at its finest.

And there is nothing wrong with trading one asset for whatever reason in sports, especially when you get a proven scorer like Kevin Martin in return. The Thunder didn’t make a bad trade because nobody lost in this deal.

Okay, so you trade the reigning sixth man of the year for Martin who can score 20 points per night. Other than age (Harden is 23, Martin is 29) and salary (Martin is making 11.52 million a year and Harden, pre-max deal, is making 4.065 million a year) you don’t lose much of anything on the court in the trade.  

Considering that Harden and Martin both averaged about 17 a game last season, you get the same scoring off the bench. Harden and Martin both average 6.3 rebounds a game over their careers and both men also get two assists per game. Harden is a better defender than Martin, yet considering how he couldn’t stop whoever he was guarding in the finals a year ago his defensive value takes a hit.

Considering Harden and Martin cancel each other out, the Thunder won the rest of the deal big time. OKC shrewdly picked up first round draft pick and human rubber band Jeremy Lamb, two first round draft picks, and a second round pick while giving up two nobodies named Cole Aldrich and Lazar Hayward.

So a fan favorite took more money to play for a team that blew itself up this off-season, it happens all the time. Of course the Thunder made this deal because of money. OKC decided that rather than paying the luxury tax, the “small market” Thunder decided to trade Harden and break up their core three players.

The Thunder are just like the Broncos of Boise State. For some reason, everyone in the area thinks that they have the small market team mentality that is a perennial power in the sport. Newsflash that is a load of crap considering that the Thunder brought in an average of 18 thousand fans a night last season, the fact that they have the second best player in the NBA, and the fact they have made the postseason for the past three seasons. The Thunder are a league powerhouse who just happens to be located in between tumbleweeds rolling in two different directions.

Harden got his money and the Thunder made their team better. Everybody wins in this trade, so that crap about Harden taking less money to be loyal to the team can just go by the wayside with the rest of the Houston Rockets.

Cruz Control

A flurry of fists from the featherweight struck forceful blows.

The punches thrown by Orlando Cruz hit home against a greater foe than his most recent opponent Jorge Pasos. Cruz’s win struck several well placed blows for openly gay athletes in every sport.

After a statement he released earlier this October, Cruz was acknowledged as the first openly gay fighter in the history of U.S. boxing. A sport where people beat the tar out of each other for a living now is the proving grounds for a man who must battle against homosexual stereotypes in addition to other boxers.

For one night, Cruz bore the weight of a movement on his slender frame. For better or worse the ongoing battle for gay acceptance was in Cruz’s corner throughout the bout. Yet if you paid to watch his bout with Jorge Pasos, the weight of any expectations failed to slow him down.

The number four featherweight boxer hammered Pasos all evening long. Even though Cruz did not secure knockout number ten in his career, he did manage a victory by unanimous decision. Yet the most telling moment came after the fight in the post fight comments form Cruz’s opponent.

Pasos said through a translator that he tried his best but the better boxer won. There was no anti-gay slurs, no bigotry, just the mutual respect of one athlete to another.

The way it should be, but unfortunately the culture of sports is not this way.

There are very few athletes who even bother to speak out against homosexual bashing. Fewer of these athletes admit to being gay themselves. And an even smaller number of these athletes come out while they are still playing.

Cruz could have taken the route of other athletes who faced his struggle and waited until his career was over before coming out. Former NBA player John Amaechi did not admit to his sexual orientation until 2007; a good three years after he played his last game for the New York Knicks. And nobody would have blamed Cruz for waiting.

The world of professional sports is not exactly a safe haven for openly gay athletes. Amaechi, one of the biggest spokesman for gay athletes, stated in a 2002 interview that “(the fact that) there's no openly gay players is no real surprise. It would be like an alien dropping down from space. There'd be fear, then panic: they just wouldn't know how to handle it.”

But Cruz knew how to handle it. He decided to tape up his hands, weigh in, and go toe to toe against the prejudice. Words can do a great deal, yet action is the catalyst of change. Cruz coming out while still fighting garners more respect than admitting it after the fact.

Even if someone were ignorant enough to call Cruz a maricon (the Spanish word for faggot), they would not be able to diminish his accomplishments. Not to mention Cruz could most likely knock out John Doe the bigot.

But for one night, Cruz showed everyone who paid to watch his bout a glimpse of what sports is all about. A performance based on one fighter landing more punches against his opponent rather than being defined by race, gender, or sexual orientation.

There is still a ways to go before Cruz’s fight becomes the norm, yet thanks to him, we are closer to making that dream a reality.

By the Way, Cano Played Worse.

          It is easy to pick on the guy whose contract is more astronomical than Felix Baumgartner. There are plenty of people who will single him out because he will be on a Cooperstown ballot as soon as he is done playing. When he is out of a game, playing poorly, and saying “call me maybe” to some female spectators, he gets dumped on; as he should.

            However, while everyone took time out of their busy schedule to bury Alex Rodriguez, they seemed to forget that there was a certain left handed second baseman that played worse. That is right, Robinson Cano had a far worse postseason than A-Rod did, yet you probably didn’t hear about it.

            While A-Rod was struggling mightily against the Baltimore Orioles, Cano couldn’t hit water if he fell out of a boat. A Rod’s batting average was .125 against the dirty birds of Maryland, Cano hit a pathetic .091. Neither man hit a home run this postseason. Against the Tigers of Detroit, A-Rod hit .111, Cano hit .056, yet media outlets across the boroughs seemed more interested in the fact A-Rod can get a girl’s number than the overall struggle of the entire team.

            And no, the argument that A-Rod is a first ballot hall of famer (if your stance on steroid users is to let them in) does not make Cano’s struggles in the postseason irrelevant. Between the two men, one has a career postseason batting average of .263 and the other man is hitting a meager .222. The higher number belongs to Rodriguez, yet because Cano has been somehow exonerated from struggling in the playoffs, A-Rod gets all the heat.

            Now that the damage has been done and the Bronx Bombers have been swept out of Comerica Park, the media haymakers are being thrown. Ian O’ Connor is saying blow it up. Jim Caple is saying get rid of A-Rod and everyone else seemingly over the age of 30. Brian Cashman is now dealing with swirling rumors that A-Rod could be going to Miami.

            Yet Cano’s struggles are the buried lead. The best player in terms of talent level and production on the most famous team in professional sports has a historically awful postseason, and the only criticism is a caption saying he went 1-18 in the ALCS.

            Cano is lucky to have a guy like A-Rod taking all the heat for him, because Cano sucks in the postseason. Remember in 2009 when A-Rod had that great postseason and the Yanks won it all? Fun fact about the Yankees second baseman that year, he hit .167 in the 09 ALDS, .261 in that ALCS, and .136 in that World Series. Also in the 09, postseason Cano had a total of 6 RBIs and 9 strikeouts. But they won, so his struggles didn’t matter.

            Once A-Rod is gone, Cano’s poor play in the postseason will not be ignored. The best player on the Yankees will actually have to own up to going 1-18 against hot starting pitching rather than hiding behind the “infidelities” of an aging icon.

            Cano got lucky he didn’t get reamed the way A-Rod did. But if his horrid postseason play continues, his luck will eventually run out. 

I Was Wrong About

            With every right there is a wrong, and many of these wrongs come from pundits across all four major sports. I am about to do something exceedingly rare in the internet age, I am going to write about the instances in which I was wrong.

Why am I taking time out of my day to admit to the things I got wrong you ask? Well it is because nobody is perfect and there are plenty of instances that I just missed completely. Also I am underneath the weight of a Kaaba (that giant cube in the heart of Mecca, Saudi Arabia for those of you who don’t know) sized writers block and this is a stopgap until I think of something better. There have been plenty of things for sure, yet I am going to make sure that everyone knows that it is quite possible to be a journalist, and still be wrong about your particular opinions.

I am lacking an award show theme idea for this one, so I’ll just say it on a scale of one to ten; one being I got an outcome of a game wrong and ten being Paul Ryan and Joe Biden incorrect when it comes to major political facts.

            This first one comes from a while ago. Remember when everybody wrote off Dwyane Wade after he tanked and pouted against the Indiana Pacers? Well, unfortunately I was part of the Wade-is-washed-up-bandwagon.

“The spark that drives Wade’s game appears to have burned out. The quickness that was synonymous with Wade’s cuts to the basket has slowed to the pace of a slug shooting jumpers. Wade has gone from a fiery competitor to a sour shooter looking for a foul call after every shot he takes..”

            Well, that bandwagon immediately steered into a puddle of kerosene and was lit on fire by the fan base of South Beach. Wade and the Heatles rolled on to the NBA Finals and right through the Oklahoma City Thunder. Wade’s final stat line from the Finals read a little something like this: 22.6 points per game, six rebounds per game, and five assists per game.

           

            Fortunately LeBron James dominance throughout the playoffs prevented this from being a seven or higher on the wrong scale. Few had a more dominant postseason than LeBron’s 2012 run, and it was because of his dominance that served as a moderate ointment for the burn Wade gave me.

            Still Wade and the Heat singed me pretty badly. Thanks to LeBron’s incredible postseason I don’t have to go to the burn ward, but it is still bad.

            I give my wrongness regarding Wade’s effectiveness a….

            6 out of 10: Getting a giant sunburn on the back of your neck because you saw the sun behind one cloud and thought ‘oh, it’s not going to be that bright out today, so I don’t need sunscreen.’

            Next up we have The Trade Deadline/Archer Award Show. This was easily one of my worst columns of the year for two reasons.

1: The fact that I pre-determined the fate of one team in the most unpredictable sport in the history of human kind. Seriously, this is the last time I write a ‘winners and losers after the MLB trade deadline’ piece. The rest of the regular season is too long for me, or anyone else, to be right about everything over a long period of time.

2: I couldn’t use any of the best quotes from Archer for obvious reasons to anyone who has ever watched the show. Unfortunately I had to settle for the Donnie Wahlberg level quotes from Archer because all of the Marky-Mark quality quotes are too offensive. Naturally Archer is my favorite animated show for these very reasons but I digress.

            Anyway here is the biggest thing I got wrong.

                                                                                               

            “By landing (Ryan) Dempster, the Rangers reminded the American League that teams still have to go through Texas to get to the World Series.”

            If I could get my hands on the delorean that only lets me go back and alter sports related predictions go back and change three events in the past I would..

• Kill Hitler because that is always the first rule of any form of time travel.
• Make sure my much younger self stayed up all night on October 27, 2004.
• And tell myself in July that the Texas Rangers were going to loose the AL West on the last day of the season, and then get bounced in the inaugural American League one game playoff; so for the love of all that is holy don’t write a column about it.

    Sadly the Delorean is in the shop so I have to live with being wrong about the Texas Rangers. Seriously, I did not think that the team with the second best batting average in the AL, a pretty good rotation, and that much postseason experience could lose to an Oakland A’s team made up mostly of unwanted Boston Red Sox who banded together for a great season.

    Also, I didn’t know that Skoal had the ability to create a Dallas sized riff, but again I digress.

    Still, I am going to give myself a bit of a break on this one. The Rangers went to the past two World Series, it was only a matter of time before someone else came and took their AL title away from them. I just did not expect it to happen in the way that it did. Oh and Dempster being a bust in the deal didn’t exactly help me.

     I give my wrongness on this one…..

     5 out of 10: Waking up early only slightly hung over from an above average night of drinking the previous evening. You know that you shouldn’t have had that much to drink, but you stopped before getting morning sickness. I could have said that the L.A. Dodgers got the better of the Beckett-Crawford-Gonzalez deal.

    I can actually make a solid segue here. The Rangers lost to the Baltimore Orioles in the wild card game (sadly which is another point I have to get to), and I effectively ended the AL manager of the year race in September.

   “The AL manager of the year race is over. Buck Showalter has guided his Orioles to meaningful September baseball for the first time in 15 years….”

    Pretty much the only portion of that statement that you need to read is the first eight words. This was when the Orioles were tailgating the Yankees division lead for the entire month. Unfortunately I made an enormous gaffe that would make Rombama  look good.

    In that column, I didn’t even mention the job done by Bob Melvin of the California Fighting Adjectives…err…I mean the Oakland Athletics.

    Seriously, I Bill Bucknered that one. Not only did the A’s win a division, but they even had a more improbable run than the fighting Showalters. The A’s had a season team batting average of .238 compared to Baltimore’s .247. The A’s were sixth in the AL in home runs when Baltimore was second, and they had a better team ERA than Baltimore did.

   Now both teams are still in the playoffs for the time being and the harshness on this one comes from calling the manager of the year race over in September with an entire pennant race still to play. It is not that Showalter is undeserving, but I didn’t even mention Melvin once in the column, so I should take a well deserved beating on that one.

    I give my wrongness for calling the AL manager of the year race over in September….

    9 out of 10: You forget to study for a major exam and you try to cheat off of the person sitting next to you; even though you know they aren’t as smart as you. However, not only are all of their answers wrong on the exam, but you get caught cheating. You fail the class and you are put on quadruple secret probation. And you try to lessen the already bad situation by making a light hearted joke at the expense of the Dean’s maternal figure during the meeting that decides your fate.

Sidebar: This will go down to an 7 out of 10 if the O’s advance to the next round and Oakland doesn’t.

    Let us turn our attention back to the O’s beating Texas in the first wild card game of the postseason. The one game playoff was supposed to make the baseball playoffs more drama packed and they succeeded like the Real Housewives of wherever succeed in fabricating drama.

    If you want to know more about why this great idea was ruined. Read this.

   The system was fine, it just became indefensible after one horrid call. I give my wrongness about the One-game-playoff….

   3 out of 10: You are walking around a big city late at night and your friend is going to make out with some dude selling Marijuana Lollipops; leaving you to wonder how you got yourself in this situation in the first place. This situation is very bad, but it was not your fault. Still, you should have accounted for something like Marijuana Lollipop man happening.

   Speaking of officials, I did not write a column about this because of time constraints. Although this one is going to be particularly hard to admit.

    I thought….I thought that the Replacement Refs weren’t going to be that bad.

    I knew that the NFL was being arrogant and stupid by not paying the real officials, yet I felt that the “experience” of the replacements were solid enough to tie us over. I also expected the NFL to hold out on paying the real refs for as long as possible because people were still going to watch the games regardless.

    Then the regular season started. Games became un-watch able and both players and coaches were blatantly ignoring the refs. Then of course the “interdown” happened on Monday Night Football.

    It was the second biggest swelling of sports related hatred from fans that has happened in recent memory; trailing only Jerry Sandusky for the top spot. 70,000 phone calls were made to Roger Goodell’s office by everyone. A senator from Wisconsin put Goodell’s number on the internet. The refs became an internet meme. And most surprisingly, a casino in Vegas gave everyone who bet on the Packers their money back after that game.

    I give my wrongness on the replacement refs…

    15 out of 10: Sounding like Skip Bayless animatedly defending one of the following organizations: The KKK, people who believe the Holocaust never happened, any Neo-Nazi organization, and anybody who defends what Jerry Sandusky did.

    There it is, my politician like gaffes in writing. I may not always get it right, but hopefully I will get it wrong a lot less in the future. 

Kill the Umpire

            

           The introduction of the one game playoff to Major League Baseball was supposed to infuse drama into a bland playoff structure. This change had the potential to add another angle to the umpteenth number of  dimensions that exist in baseball to date. The one game playoff was supposed to enhance the integrity of competition.

            Instead, the illustrious career of Chipper Jones ended in an explosion of profanities and hurricane of empty aluminum cans. Replacement official….correction left field umpire Sam Holbrook single-handedly killed the Braves season with one of the worst calls in recent memory.

            In the eighth inning, a popup by Andrelton Simmons listed lazily to left field and dropped between two Cardinals. Yet Holbrook ruled that the play was a product of the infield fly rule and Simmons was out.

            Again, an umpire whose job it is to patrol the outfield called the infield fly rule when the ball was at least 50 feet from the dirt.

            Thanks to Holbrook, defending this one-game-winner-goes-to-play-Washington scenario is virtually indefensible. The one game playoff now looks like a moronic idea right up there with calling the 2002 All-Star Game a tie and canceling the 1994 World Series. There was a fair amount of criticism of the one game playoff entering the day, yet this horrid call ending a team’s season will ignite the fiery anger of social media users.

            Holbrook will now go down in umpire infamy reserved for Jim Joyce, Tim McClelland, and Don Denkinger. Although Holbrook did not take away a perfect game, forget the rules of safe and out in the middle of a game, or rob a team of a World Series title, he ended a team’s pursuit of the Commissioner’s Trophy. Holbrook can’t show his face in Georgia after this game, and it was his own doing.

            Nobody should be more upset about this call than Chipper Jones. There could not have been a worse ending for one of the classiest Atlanta Braves in recent memory. This may have been Jones’ last postseason regardless of the outcome, yet the Hall Of Fame career of Larry should not have ended as a result of a politician-like gaffe from Holbrook.

Sure Jones got an infield hit in his final at-bat as a Brave, yet that was rendered useless thanks to a ground out by Dan Uggla to cement the tragedy.

Normally the prevailing argument can be made that the Braves had other chances to win the game. Yes the call incorrectly produced a second out in the eighth inning, yet the Braves could have gotten three runs in four outs. After all, it is baseball, crazier things have happened in the postseason.

Not this time. Atlanta got shafted by whatever unpleasantly large object you choose to picture. Baseball is a game where momentum overrides stardom in the postseason, and Holbrook gutted the Braves run like a baby pig before a roast.

Jones did not deserve to have his career end this way. The Braves fans did not deserve to have their season end this way. And the team certainly did not deserve to lose this way.

But this is baseball, and anything can happen. Including NFL replacement refs wearing MLB umpire clothes and ruining what could have been a fantastic idea for everyone. 

Triple Threat

The Season closes with a crown replacing the Detroit tigers hat worn by Miguel Cabrera.

Cabrera conquered three kingdoms throughout the regular season. He seized territories in the realms of batting average, home runs, and runs batted in. The almighty Triple Crown sits upon the head of a Tiger.

By no means was Cabrera’s conquest flashy, and he almost got caught. The Tiger went 0-2 in the game and was taken out in the fourth inning of the final regular season game of 2012.

Factor in Curtis Granderson of the Yankees hitting two home runs on the season’s last day and a Shakespearean tragedy was almost upon us. Still, Granderson, Josh Hamilton, and the rest of baseball fell flat in their storming of Cabrera’s statistical fortress. 

This new king of baseball’s iron throne is not the first Tiger to reach statistical nirvana. Ty Cobb accomplished the feat back in 1909. You know, a year removed from the Chicago Cubs winning their only World Series for the century.

There were only ten other men in American League history who ravaged the landscape of baseball like Alexander the Great. The most recent man was Carl Yastrzemski, in 1967. And even though Cabrera did not channel his inner Mickey Mantle and go 5-5 in his last game of the year, he didn’t have to. Cabrera has achieved statistical dominance that Musial, Aaron, Bonds, Clemente, and Kaline never did in a single season.

Any claim that Cabrera backed into baseball immortality is laughable. Cabrera had eleven more runs batted in than Hamilton, a batting average four points higher than super-rookie Mike Trout, and more homers than anyone else in baseball.

Also let us not forget to thank the foot soldiers who helped their king achieve glory. No one man can conquer a castle and since Cabrera did not hit 139 solo home runs, some credit has to be given to his teammates for getting on base for him to knock home.

This crowning achievement has effectively ended the best hitter in the game debate that took up the better part of the season. The tiger has power to all fields the trout can’t match. Sure, Trout’s speed and ability to steal more bases than the hamburglar steals burgers keep the best overall player debate going. However, the most dangerous weapon in baseball is the 33 ounce timber on Cabrera’s shoulder.

Not to mention Cabrera’s conquest and great pitching down the stretch by Detroit has the Tigers in the playoffs. No wildcard game birth, but rather AL Central Champions. Trout will be gone fishing this October.

Greatness is given not earned. In the 2012 season, Cabrera seized statistical awards, immortality, and a playoff birth in one campaign. And whatever happens in October and November, Cabrera will be remembered for the realms he conquered even if he does not win the biggest prize of all.

Here is How We Fix the NFL.......

           

            Turn off your television sets. 

            Look away from the shamefulness of this damaged game. If you need sporting entertainment, there is quite an exciting pennant race going on in baseball.  It may seem impossible to do, yet it is the only way to get the real referees back.

Last night the integrity of football dissolved right before our eyes. The replacements made a call that cost somebody a game. Although the normal refs would have also faced a great deal of scrutiny for this call, they would have at least discussed the play first. Yet as much as you will yell, curse, and tweet, there is one harsh reality that for some reason many do not understand.

The NFL doesn’t give a crap about its fans. As long as you are still eating up whatever they serve, the league will continue to serve you the same previously digested pig meat.

Think about it. If you go to a restaurant and get poorly prepared food there are two courses of action. You could pitch a fit, throw your food at the waiter, demand a refund, and demand the restaurant makes certain staff changes. However, you will then be seen as a jerk and if you go back to that same restaurant, they will still serve you food that tastes like wet dog.

The other course of action is to not go. If enough people stop going to a restaurant, they have no choice but to make changes because they are bleeding revenue. The NFL has the exact same mindset.

It is tragically funny to see and hear talking heads act so shocked that multi-billion dollar cooperation doesn’t give a flying fudge about the fans they are supposed to be catering to. Steve Young of ESPN was the only one who seemed to get this very critical point. Everyone is yelling about the same thing, yet their cries of anguish will be ignored while the NFL bathes in its billions.

It is a basic fighting principal that hard must be met with soft to do more damage, and this is now a fight to get the real refs back. Everybody screaming at the league about the broken integrity of the game will be lost in the vacuum of NFL space. Instead, what must be done is the soft approach: turn off your television set.

That means that you the fans have to sacrifice in order to make the NFL listen.

This means no fantasy updates. No Tebow coverage. No are the Saints on the verge of implosion debates. Not even any complaining about how bad the replacement refs are. If you want your game to be fixed, you actually have to give something up in order to make that happen.

I know sacrificing something for the greater good sounds weird, but it must be done. Otherwise the NFL will continue to feed you the same crap for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Do not fear. In this instance not watching your team will not make you any less of a fan. If you want the NFL to be fixed, you have to refuse to accept the product the league has sent out.

Otherwise you look stupid for giving that same terrible restaurant more of your money. 

And the Loser is...Everyone who Cares About Hockey

          Congratulations Garry Bettman, Sidney Crosby and everyone else at the decision making table for the NHL. You have officially passed college football as the most incompetent group of people running a sport in the business.

            Oh it took quite a bit of effort to wrestle the crown away from the BCS. College football had you beat by letting a team that did not even win its own conference play for, and win the sport’s championship. Yet you, the NHL, remained determined to one day hoist the crown and hold it over your head like the most coveted trophy in sports.

            And you finally did it. When college football announced their four team playoff system you responded with the fourth work stoppage in league history.

            We have seen this debauchery three times in the last 20 years; though the numbers are bigger this time. The players were so hung up on hanging on to their precious 57 percent of total league revenue they forgot that they get more of their league’s revenue than the players in the NBA (51 percent)  and NFL(between 46 and 48 percent).

            While the owners laugh at that last statistic, they forget that guys like Bruins owner Jeremy Jacobs make them look just as stupid. Jacobs, who happens to head the NHL board of governors, demanded that the new CBA have players’ deals be capped at five years. Just days before, he signed Tyler Seguin to a six year contract extension.

            And like in every lockout, the true victims of any work stoppage are the fans of the sport and the game itself.

NHL fans are golden retriever loyal to a sport run by morons. Bettman, Crosby, all of you abuse their loyalty so badly, Sarah McLachlan is on the verge of making a commercial about it. Bettman has repeatedly championed the fans’ loyalty to the sport, and then plunged a knife in their backs by stopping games.

With his third lockout in his commissioning career, Bettman has stopped his sport from conducting business and somehow still has a job. Since he has been commissioner, Bettman has been responsible for a total of 414 days of lockout; excluding the upcoming one.

Think about this. Bettman has more days locking out his players than Ryan Whitney and Joe Corvo have career assists combined.

            There is a certain determination that exists in actively pursing the title of most incompetent group of people running a sport. It takes a lot of chutzpah to shut down your league after you made close to 3 billion dollars last season; a new league record by the way.

Even though the lockout was a foregone conclusion, the inevitable remains infuriating. Enjoy the title of most incompetent sport in the business NHL; see you in 2013-2014. Maybe.

             

A Buried Lead

Devon Walker will never play a down on Sundays. He will never win the Jim Thorpe Award for best defensive back in the country. Walker’s team, the Green Wave of Tulane University, will likely never host College Gameday on ESPN.

These are just some factors as to why the kid who broke his neck in a game has become a one day story.

On the final play of the first half, Walker went in for a tackle and his helmet met the plastic headgear of a teammate. The resulting collision fractured Walker’s spine, collapsed his lung, and broke his neck.

The Memphis Commercial Appeal and ESPN.com both reported that Walker was in stable condition after being rushed to a Tulsa hospital. Both of these sites also reported that Walker’s mother watched her son break his neck on TV.

The big media outlets filed the Devon Walker story and ceased their coverage. It was time to ignore Walker’s condition and focus on whether to start Adrian Peterson or Maurice Jones-Drew for your fantasy team.

Expanding on Walker’s injury and questioning the safety of football would have put a damper on the NFL’s opening day. A multi-billion dollar industry would have had to share the media cycle with the demons of their game; but that didn’t happen.

The season debuts of the pro teams were too important to the big time networks. Peyton Manning playing on a new team, the expectations for the Pittsburgh Steelers, and of course everyone’s fantasy team was more important than the life threatening injury to Devon Walker.

A college senior fracturing his spine during a game did little to continue the national debate about the safety of football. The death of Junior Seau had a media cycle that lasted for days, and prompted several well reported stories relating to concussions in the NFL. Walker’s story had the impact of throwing a pebble into the ocean. When in reality, the horrid image of a player dying on a football field looks clearer than ever.

There is a good chance Walker will never walk for the rest of his life. Yet he isn’t a deceased hall of famer, a player on a noteworthy football school, or a kid on Mel Kiper’s draft board, so he clearly doesn't  matter.

Not all media outlets were guilty of dropping the story like Terrell Owens. Yahoo!Sports, USA Today, and SportingNews.com did their jobs by following up on Walker’s condition. Whether or not Walker would ever walk, let alone play football again, was not even on the home page of ESPN.com on Sunday morning.

Even still a young man almost died on a football field, and his story gets buried in less than a day. Meanwhile Tim Tebow, a quarterback who couldn’t hit water if he fell out of a boat, gets an entire summer’s worth of media coverage for taking his shirt off in the rain.

Somebody’s priorities are really messed up.

A family almost lost a son to a game where bone shattering collisions are encouraged. Instead of questioning the culture of America’s favorite collision sports, or filing stories about the devastating impacts of helmet to helmet hits, the media turned our attention to bigger behemoths hitting each other at faster speeds instead. Yet for the most part, the audience turned away from the ugliness of the game to see something else.

What nobody will be watching is if Devon Walker will ever walk again. And the decision to ignore the dangers of football, could lead to the death of somebody else’s son. Chances are, unless Tom Brady dies in a head to head collision next week, it will be downplayed as somebody else’s tragedy.

Sadly, we are all someone else to someone else. 

The O's Have Learned to Fly

           Perhaps the most beautiful and nonsensical story of this season has been the play of the little birdies from Baltimore.

            Armed with the 22^nd best team batting average, the 17^th best team earned run average in the bigs, and the 23^rd best attendance in the league, the Orioles are tied with the Yankees atop the American League East.

Their team is not only absent of big names, it is riddled with guys you have probably never heard of. However, they are playing meaningful games in September for the first time since 1997.

This Jim Johnson character that has racked up 41 saves this year does not get the CY Young considerations that Cincinnati Reds closer Aroldis Chapman does. Their best hitter, Adam Jones, is a career .280 hitter. Their number three hitter, Nate McClouth, is hitting .210. Yet  for the O's, the siren song of the postseason is within earshot.

It is possible to ask how this Orioles team is hanging around while barely cracking the top 20 in the bigs in payroll (they are 19^th). Well, the Orioles either lead the big leagues, or are in the top ten, in the “Chutzpah statistics.”

The Orioles have not lost a game this season after obtaining a lead after the seventh inning. Seriously, they are 60-0 when leading after seven innings.

The O’s have the third most saves in baseball. They also have the seventh best earned run average in the majors away from Camden Yards. The “Chutzpah statistics” ,not sabermetrics, have enabled the O’s to rival the Yankees this season; all thanks to the head of the flock.

The AL manager of the year race is over. Buck Showalter has guided his Orioles to meaningful September baseball for the first time in 15 years. Anybody who thought the O’s were going anywhere this season is either a die-hard O’s fan or a liar.

Credit Robin Ventura of the White Sox for getting his team to play well to this point. Joe Girardi should get votes for holding his injury plagued Yankees together with silly string and scotch tape.

However, Ventura’s team is hitting .257 compared to the fighting Showalter’s batting average of .247. Also the White Sox are in a much weaker division than the talent riddled AL East.

As for Girardi, he will not get votes because the Yankees are expected to be in it every year; whether those expectations are fair or not. The Orioles are relevant in baseball for the first time in the new millennium thanks to Showalter.

Nobody has done more with less this season than Showalter. It has been his management skills that have propelled the Orioles to the perch they sit on today.

It makes no sense for the O’s to be here, yet that is the beauty of baseball: very little ever makes sense. While Showalter will be the only one to get accolade recognition, these dirty birds will continue to fly towards October. 

Enough of the Racket

            

            Andy Roddick’s racket bears the weight of a five ton sledgehammer. Not because he has not won a major in nine years, but because he held the title of America’s best in tennis.

            Now, it appears that the weight of expectations has finally proved to be too much for Roddick. The former U.S. Open winner will retire at the end of this major; the one that made him famous.

            When Roddick hoisted the U.S. Open Trophy in 2003, he also held the future of U.S. tennis in his grasp. Roddick was supposed to carry the torch of American tennis  Andre Agassi and John McEnroe once held. He certainly was talented enough.

In his prime Roddick was quite good. His serve went from zero to 155 miles per hour at the bat of an eyelash. His slices cut through the hard surfaces of the RCA Championship, the Canadian Masters, and the other 30 tournaments he won.

Yet in an era of legends, quite good was never good enough. Roger Federer won more majors than any other tennis player in history. When Federer didn’t win, his rival Rafael Nadal did. When Nadal didn’t win, Novak Djokovic did. Despite Roddick’s talent, one man’s good is not enough to best another man’s great.

There were not enough major titles for Roddick once Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic started reeling them in. Sure Roddick is 5-4 career against Djokovic, yet the Serbian has five major titles at age 25 compared to Roddick’s 1 at age 30.

            As for Nadal, Roddick is 3-7 all time against the Spaniard. Nadal also has ten more majors than Roddick; and they have both been playing for 13 years.

The closest Roddick ever came to besting one of the three giants of the game was in the titanic Wimbledon Final against Roger Federer in 2009. In that four hour slugfest, Roddick’s serve was broken only once; for the championship point that gave Federer more majors than anyone else.

Roddick was never able to reach the plateau of greatness that the three kings occupy today. Yet that is not his fault. There are other good athletes that are overshadowed by great ones.

Golf’s sentimental favorite is the perfect example. Phil Mickelson is a very good golfer with four major titles. However, for the better part of the new millennium, he has had to carry Tiger Wood’s jock strap; just like the rest of the field. It’s nobody’s fault, it was just Tiger was so great for so long.

Roddick suffers the same fate as lefty. His really good play was overshadowed by the greatness of others. Both Mickelson and Roddick both have emptier trophy cases because of greater players. Neither of them is at fault for winning more because really good does not beat great in the world of sports.

This summer will end with Roddick hanging up his racket. Even though Roddick will always be remembered for how he lost, A-Rod will never forget that glorious day in 2003 when greatness was his. 

The Cherington-Colletti Conversation

            (Phone rings)

Ned Colletti, General Manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers: Hello?

Ben Cherington, General Manager of the Boston Red Sox: Ned! Hey it’s great to hear your voice. How is business?

Colletti: Oh it’s pretty good. We are one and a half games out of the Wild Card race. We have the second lowest Earned Run Average in the National League and have given up the second fewest hits in the NL. The offense isn’t looking too good though…

Cherington: What about your deals for Shane Victorino and Hanley Ramirez at the trade deadline?

Colletti: Well Hanley has been good for us, but we are still hitting .251 as a team. Victorino has been awful for us. He has one homer and seven runs batted in as a Dodger. And we are paying him nine million bucks. I can’t wait until he leaves town.

Cherington: Sounds like you need a bat.

Colletti: What did you have in mind?

Cherington: Well as you know, we put Adrian Gonzalez on waivers recently…

Colletti: We’ll take him!

Cherington: Glad to see you are interested. Now let’s make a deal shall we?

Colletti: Okay Howie. What do you want?

Cherington: So you know that De La Rosa kid? How about him and two other prospects for Gonzalez?

Colletti: Three prospects for Gonzalez? Come on Ben you can do better than that. Gonzalez is hitting .212 at Dodger Stadium for his career. You can give me a little more than that.

Cherington: Okay. Then how about we take James Loney off your hands?

Colletti: Go on…

Cherington: Great it’s settled! We give you Gonzalez, Carl Crawford, Josh Beckett, and Nick Punto for Loney and three prospects.

Colletti: Sounds go…WHAT?!?!?! How did Crawford and Beckett get in there? I’m okay with you trying to sneak Punto by me. Punto is about as exciting as vanilla ice cream, but he is harmless as a player. Did you fall out of the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down?

Cherington: Hey, you need offense. I’m offering you offense.

Colletti: Carl Crawford’s three homers and 19 runs batted in is not offense. Not to mention that he needs Tommy John surgery; like the rest of your team. What do you guys get a discount for every player on your team who needs Tommy John surgery?

As for Beckett, you have got to be off your rocker! He is 5-11 with a 5.39 ERA. Chris Capuano has a lower ERA and more wins. Not to mention Beckett makes Simon Cowell look like Mr. Rogers.

I have seen some stupid offers in my day, but this is the king of them all. You are offering us two guys who each make over 100 million bucks; meanwhile only one of them has been remotely productive. And your starter would make our rotation worse just by showing up.

Now if you wanted to eat a lot of the money for this…

Cherington: Actually that is the other thing. It would be so great if you guys ate most of the money…

Colletti: YOU’VE GOT TO BE SH*@!*&^ ME!! So let me get this straight. You want us to eat 249 million dollars and give you one of our best prospects?! Stick your offer where the sun don’t shine! This is not a video game Ben. This is baseball!

Did  your sports talk radio listeners call and tell you to make me this offer? Well I’ve got news for you. Ned Colletti is no fool. Good day to you sir!

Cherington: Ned wait…

Colletti: I SAID GOOD DAY SIR!!

(click)

(20 minutes later)

Colletti: Ben your guys are willing to waive their no trade clauses right…

Cherington: Of course!!!(*coughs) I mean, of course. What made you change your mind?

Colletti: Ownership thinks that we need big named, low production players in order to bring back the L.A. Dodgers brand.

They said that the fans will be so blinded by the number of big names coming in that they will overlook the awful seasons and contracts.

Cherington: Sounds great. I will get the paper work started right away.

(click)

Colletti: Get me a glass of bourbon and keep them coming. I’m going to need a lot of them to make me forget I made this deal.